AuthorTopic: Beatles 4 Sale Cover Songs (Read 7317 times)

Raxo and I have been into this discussion before. But I keep coming back to it. It's about the coversongs The Beatles recorded to make the Beatles For Sale album. Positions: Bobber says they recorded them because they lacked original material, Raxo states that they wanted to record these songs because they loved them. And we don't agree...

Quote from: 297

Curious to me ...

Let's take a view to their ... their classic covers? (I mean those that they performed on stage during most of their tours and gigs) ... and to the weird ones too ...

from Please Please Me :

1. Twist And Shout (John) (Hamburg till the end)... and no more 'cos Boys was played just a few times ...

from Wth The Guys:

1. Roll Over Beethoven (George) (Hamburg till mid 60s)2. Money (That's All I Want) (John) (lots of times)... and no more 'cos Till There Was You and You Really Got A Hold On Me (on stage by late 63 ... till mid 64?)

from Guys For Sale:

1. Rock And Roll Music (John)2. Kansas City/Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey (Paul)3. Everybody's Trying To Be My Baby (George)... all of these well-known classics till the end ...

--------------------

They also loved obscure covers, didn't they ...

from Please Please Me could be:

Chains, A Taste Of Honey, Anna (Go To Him)

from Wth The Beatles:

Devil In Her Heart, Till There Was You

from Beatles For Sale:

Mr. Moonlight, Words Of Love

What I'm trying to say is that they recorded some classics and some obscure covers on each album till mid-60s: Rubber Soul, right? (except for A Hard Day's Night -because they cheated including the 4 songs of the singles, ... they'd only got 9 songs for that album, only one more than usual-) ...

... but it seems that the album that contains the most classics of their repertoire and the less-east weird ones is precisely[/i] Beatles For Sale ...

... a different thing is if you like those covers ... but at least those audiences seemed to do it ... and The Beatles themselves (how many times John, Paul and George played Rock And Roll Music (John), Kansas City/Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey (Paul) and Everybody's Trying To Be My Baby (George)?) ...

After all, their original songs on With The Beatles are not as great as the ones on other albums and that's the week-east point for it ...

Now, The Beatles recorded six covers for Beatles For Sale: Rock And Roll Music, Mr Moonlight, Kansas City/Hey Hey Hey Hey, Honey Don't, Words Of Love and Everybody's Trying To Be My Baby. Songs from their Hamburg/Cavern days. They started to play three of them again after releasing the album. In my opinion, they picked covers that were certainly not the best ones of their old days, although a lot of people like RARM and KC. But Ringo's version of Honey Don't is forgettable, Words Of Love lacks the brilliance of other songs from that period and ETTBMB is quite repetitive (sp?). Mr Moonlight is ranked among the worst songs they ever recorded. Listening to the Hamburg Tapes and the BBC stuff, I feel there were much better songs they could have picked. What's your opinion on this?

I agree with Raxo on this one. Other than AHDN Beatle albums were a mix of covers and originals. These covers are mostly favourities from their stage shows. Up until Beatles For Sale the covers sat quite nicely with the originals. But by BFS their originals were progressing, leaving the covers sounding incongrous. Same for Help! In my book Dizzy Miss Lizzie and Act Naturally don't sound right next to the originals. By '65 their style had datedSo I think - the covers stayed to standard, but the originals changed, making the covers seem out of place.

I'm with Bobber on this. Rush job with not enough original material equals covers. None of the covers on BFS are great in my opinion. Although I enjoy listening to pretty much all Beatle material, if those covers never existed, I wouldnt miss them.

But but but.......Please Please Me had six covers. With The Beatles had seven. (at a time when they were handing out chart-topping originals to other acts like hotcakes)Beatles For Sale had six. If you discount A Hard Days Night as a special project (being a soundtrack) then Beatles For Sale stops being an oddity and becomes just another Beatle album.I think the inclusion of covers was a deliberate decision, not forced on them by lack of original material.Certainly they might have made a better choice on the covers they chose, but can we really put that down to laziness or time pressure?Bobber - what other covers would you have put on BFS?

Take into consideration what kind of year they had in 1964: Coming to America, touring the world twice, TV appearances, and recordings up the wazoo, I mean, by the time they got to 'Beatles for Sale', they must have been tapped, so in addition to some brilliant originals, they probably just fell back on some old standbys. I don't know how they got through '64 without having a collective nervous breakdown.I'm pretty sure the last cover they did was 'Act Naturally' which was on Y & T here in the States.

Certainly they might have made a better choice on the covers they chose, but can we really put that down to laziness or time pressure?Bobber - what other covers would you have put on BFS?

I always felt that I'm Gonna Sit Right Down And Cry Over You sounded somewhat like I Don't Want To Spoil The Party. I Got A Woman is another favourite. The Honeymoon Song. Don't Ever Change. I need two more...

I always felt that I'm Gonna Sit Right Down And Cry Over You sounded somewhat like I Don't Want To Spoil The Party. I Got A Woman is another favourite. The Honeymoon Song. Don't Ever Change. I need two more...

Beatles For Sale is a great album and I don't mind the covers when they're good.It suffers from two or three bad decisions.

First Mr Moonlight which should have been ditched for Kitten.Second ETTBMB which should have been at the end of side one and without all that awful echo.It needs to be crisp and upbeat but they almost managed to ruin it entirely.And lastly they should have put Kansas City at the end of side two to go out with rocker.Plus all those Bye-byes would have been more appropriate at the end.

An interesting thread, raising some points that I'd never considered before - like how the covers were all pre-1962 songs which they played in Liverpool/Hamburg, so the standard of the covers stayed at one level while the Beatles' own songwriting and recording improved dramatically from album to album.

I personally don't think BFS is any worse than PPM or WTB, though I admit I'd probably put those three behind all other albums apart from YS. I know Mr Moonlight gets slated but it has never bothered me - certainly not one of my favourite Beatle tracks but I can think of quite a few I like less (Honey Don't being one of them!). I think Kansas City and Rock n Roll Music are great rocking songs and I've always liked Words of Love (probably because I like Buddy Holly). Everybody's Trying to be my Baby is nothing special but it's not terrible either (and they needed a George vocal on the album to please the George fans). Leave My Kitten Alone is one of my favourite Beatles covers and I think it would have gone well on BFS but they already had a John rocker with RARM.

I sometimes wonder if the reason that BFS is never higher up peoples' lists of favourite albums (including my own) is not because of the covers but because the original songs are predominantly "down" songs - I'm a Loser, I don't want to spoil the party so I'll go, Baby's in black and I'm feeling blue, I nearly died, One day you'll find that I have gone, I'm feeling blue and lonely. The lyrics to Every Little Thing are positive, but the music does have a downbeat feel. Only Eight Days a Week out of the originals could truly be said to be an upbeat song. I think the covers (most of them) at least inject some fun into the proceedings, even if they are beginning to sound outdated when compared to the originals.

I do think that BFS is something of a step backwards for The Beatles after AHDN - and the covers contribute to this - but given the year that they'd had it's not a surprise. They must have been struggling for original material and wanted to get an album out in time for Christmas so had to pick a few of their favourite oldies to make up the numbers. Plus it's an unfair comparison anyway because AHDN contains two A-sides and 2 great B-sides. If they'd dropped Honey Don't and Mr Moonlight from BFS and added the single tracks I Feel Fine and She's a Woman it would have made it a much stronger album (and more upbeat), yet they were trying to give value for money to fans by not putting their singles onto LPs.

I sometimes wonder if the reason that BFS is never higher up peoples' lists of favourite albums (including my own) is not because of the covers but because the original songs are predominantly "down" songs - I'm a Loser, I don't want to spoil the party so I'll go, Baby's in black and I'm feeling blue, I nearly died, One day you'll find that I have gone, I'm feeling blue and lonely. The lyrics to Every Little Thing are positive, but the music does have a downbeat feel. Only Eight Days a Week out of the originals could truly be said to be an upbeat song. I think the covers (most of them) at least inject some fun into the proceedings, even if they are beginning to sound outdated when compared to the originals.

You might be right with that theory, but to be honest, 'I'm A Loser', 'I'll Follow The Sun', 'Every Little Thing' and even 'What Your Doing' have always been favorites of mine so who knows.

I do think that BFS is something of a step backwards for The Beatles after AHDN - and the covers contribute to this - but given the year that they'd had it's not a surprise. They must have been struggling for original material and wanted to get an album out in time for Christmas so had to pick a few of their favourite oldies to make up the numbers.

That's an assumption I have trouble with. Apart from AHDN all Beatle albums had covers. It was how pre 66 Beatle albums were made, whether they were rushed or not. They put Dizzie Miss Lizzie on Help! when we know they had enough original material to hold over for RS. They released EP's of covers. The two EP's from BFS both contain a cover, even though they had enough originals not to bother. It's just what they did.